Palm Beach Dive Thread

[Johnoly]

...Visibility dropped to 30ft.

About the middle of June they were releasing Lk Okee to prep for Hurricane season. But they stopped doing releases a week ago. Today they opened 1 gate at only a 6 inch crack to clean it when it's a 9 foot tall gate.. This cruddy water is from the gulf side loop currents and the divers over in Ft. Myers said it's still crap. Unless we get a strong east wind to blow in in some colder blue water, it's gonna take a week or more to clean up the viz. We'll get some light east winds for mini-season Weds & Thurs, but I'm putting my 7mm chewing gum wetsuit in the V-berth just incase we get a 62 degree upwhelling. I hope it just sits dry there and is a complete waste of time. I'm expecting 3-4 footers for both days with gusts at 15mph. Definitely diveable and we'll see if we can find bugs.

 

[bassplayer]

I'm curious what source you're all using for forecasting the conditions - i've been looking at surfline for shore dives and that seems good, but not sure what's best to check for jupiter and palm beach boats

 

[Johnoly]

...i've been looking at surfline for shore dives and that seems good, but not sure what's best to check for jupiter and palm beach boats

Was some discussion earlier this week on the Jupiter thread. Here is a link to my forecasting tips,,,,but I've been burned before like everyone else here.

Jupiter Dive Thread

I'll have to check this place out, thanks.

scubaboard.com

 

[Divin'Papaw]

Was some discussion earlier this week on the Jupiter thread. Here is a link to my forecasting tips,,,,but I've been burned before like everyone else here.

Jupiter Dive Thread

I'll have to check this place out, thanks.

scubaboard.com

All of us gather data from various sources plus web cams ... and we all still get burned sometimes. I've been out with a 3-4' forecast and we got to endure 4-6' with occasional 7s. I've also seen boats cancel because of projected 4-5' that ended up being more like 2s. So we watch, monitor, gather data, make an educated guess from our experience watching SE FL weather, and still always remember that the weather is gonna do what it's gonna do.

 

[NothingClever]

I enjoyed four dives on Saturday with Kyalami departing out of the Riviera Beach Marina.

We did:

Las Patas
Breakers
Corridor
Drifting Spot

Good dose of reef sharks, turtles and GGs.

Most noteworthy were three things.

First, a really mature GG had a big tail fin sticking out of its mouth and that was certainly intriguing. I’ll try to post a screen shot in the next few days. It’ll probably be unimpressive on your computer monitor or phone but it was definitely impressive when I filmed it up close.

Second, the reef topography had much more defined and interesting contours (extended spurs, draws and sharp banks) compared to Jupiter. While Jupiter almost always promises big sealife, the reef (that I’ve seen) is a bit mundane. WPB has much more interesting terrain.

Lastly, the health of the reef with purple fan coral, reef plants and large number of schools of fish were also impressive.

Luke (skipper), Mike, Sydney and Sarah are a great crew. Luke’s safety briefs and Mike and Sydney’s dive briefs were crisply-delivered and complete. Luke and the deck hand on duty exercise great control during pick ups.

I don’t have any special relationship with Kyalami. I just have very low tolerance for some of the grab-assery I’ve seen in Florida recreational diving. When I run into a well-organized charter with competent crew members I like to share the good news. If I continue recreational diving, I’ll probably spring for the large dive package as it does represent a decent savings.

Tulipan Bakery was well-stocked and opened in plenty of time to scoop up breakfast for the crew and make the 07:00 initial manifest call. However, don’t expect anyone at the bakery to speak English. If you want to catch up on election implications in Venezuela, game on.

 

[Johnoly]

While Jupiter almost always promises big sealife, the reef (that I’ve seen) is a bit mundane. WPB has much more interesting terrain.

That's why we love Palm Beach County diving - There's something different for everyone to love right next to each other

How was viz & currents in WPB for you ??

 

[NothingClever]

At the first drop the surface was glassy so I anticipated lots of kicking. Nope! The Palm Beach County Underwater Moving Sidewalk was fully activated and stayed that way on all four dives.

Vis was spectacular to good. I’ll try to grab a screenshot of the first wreck (Anna Cecilia) we visited on Corridor. It was a treat to get going on the drift, sense the dark shape, guide towards it and see the bow of the upright hull start coming into sharp focus about 50m out. Then I saw a GG just above the seabed and had to go check him out. The second wreck was where I saw the GG with the tail fin seemingly stuck in his mouth.

On the last dive we reached the end of the reef but not the end of the dive. I hung out for a little staying low and slow to check out the itty bitty sea life, got a little bored and then deployed my buoy to enjoy flying the blue skies over the desert for about 15 minutes to finish the dive. While the absence of reef can seem boring or maybe unsettling to newer divers, it’s fun to see the occasional bedouins making their desert journey from one reef to another.

 

[NothingClever]

 

[MrChen]

I went out Sunday on a private boat, north of the inlet. Visibility was around 60ft. There were 3 layers of water temp with a mixing affect below 75ft and a slight thermocline around 40ft. The current was moving pretty good. Surface currents were really strong. On any given dive, we covered 2 miles. I think I did 2.5 miles on the first dive. I was only spearfishing. I did shoot a hogfish. I saw a few yellow jacks but couldn't close the gap to get a shot. Saw some turtles, a moray eel on spearman's barge, and some nurse sharks. One of our guys was approached by a tiger shark on his safety stop. He was quick to get out of the water .

 

[Johnoly]

I think I did 2.5 miles on the first dive.

When I'm driving the boat and get a reading like this, I'm really glad I'm running 2 GPS's and watching their data numbers,, shaking my head saying " Well they can't both be wrong". Any captain will tell you, Dive flags will lie to you but bubbles won't. I'll pull up next to our dive flag to make sure there's bubbles coming up next to it, cause divers can lose a flag in strong current. And that why we stay off our phones when driving. Eyes on the water looking for 2nd backup flags or fish floats !!

Thanks for the condition report @MrChen !!